During my high school years, I used to frequently visit these gaming arcades. At that time, their library of games included Fatal Fury, X-Men vs. Street Fighter, Art of Fighting, Virtua Fighter, and other arcade hits which by now are playable under the MAME, or the arcade emulator. Also, these arcades have been frequently visited by school children even during the entire school week as well as out-of-school youth. Because of the influx of young visitors coming from various schools, these arcades during my time have been flourishing, as the income these facilities receive come from students. Nowadays, these arcades are not that full of people anymore, given the rise of next generation consoles which have taken a huge chunk of the income received by these arcades.

Do you still visit these gaming arcades, and how would you compare the arcades then and now?

Growing up in a small village, the only times I went to arcades when I was younger was when they came with the fair. But I do remember them fondly, trying to beat House of the Dead 2 with my cousin or duking it out on fighting games (Marvel vs. Capcom mostly).

The small city where I moved in for the beginning of my post-high school studies didn't had any arcade so I was disappointed but started playing arcade games on MAME (I've had Internet quite late, even by today's standards ^^).

More recently, when I moved in a bigger city, the only "arcades" I could find had a very limited set of games and frankly, given the prices, they were out of price (like 2€ for a game). So for me it's mostly gaming on emulators ^^